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"I hadn't been frightened all day, but I was worried about my tee shot on 18. I pulled it about 18 in., into the rough at the left. I had an awful lie, but at least I was in bounds. I had about a 180-yd. shot to the green, but I had to clear a trap, and from my lie it was questionable. So I did the safest possible thing: I took out my wedge and played it onto the fairway short of the trap. I figured that I was 103 yds. away from the front of the green, 137 yds. from the back, and 130 yds. from the pin. 'An easy giron will get you to the front,' I said to myself. 'A hard 9 will get you over. So let's hit a nice easy one.' I hit it just right-about 130 yds., 12 ft. to the left of the cup. Then Palmer hit his pitch shot and I thought. 'Oh God. I guess I just have to expect it to go in.' But it didn't; it rolled past about 10 ft. Even then, I wasn't sure of winning. If he made his putt and I three-putted, we were going to the 19th—and even making a two-footer isn't easy when it means a national championship. But Arnie missed, and I thought. 'Well, finally, it's over.' " All that remained was the last, quick putt, and a brief handclasp from a tired, dejected and thoroughly-beaten Palmer.
Young Man's Business. The end of the Open was more than a Nicklaus triumph: it showed vividly how golf, the middle-aged man's pastime, is becoming a young man's business. Of the first seven finishers, only one—Arnold Palmer—was over 30. For the first time in 13 years, Ben Hogan, now 49 and the hero of four Opens, was not even in the field. Balding Sam Snead, 49, trying for the 21st time for the victory he has always wanted most, wound up tied for 38th. More than ever before, pro golf belonged to the prodigies—the irreverent, burr-headed youngsters to whom no course is too tough, no challenge too bold, no competitor too strong. Three of the best:
>PHIL RODGERS, 24, fifth (with $27,830) in money winnings in his first full year, is already a hard-nosed pro who considers victory his rightful due. A short, stocky exmarine. Rodgers has won two tournaments (Los Angeles Open. Tucson Open), finished among the top five in three others. He could have won the Open: at the end, he was only two strokes behind Palmer and Nicklaus—despite the fact that he had wasted five strokes in the first two rounds. On opening day, Rodgers hooked a drive into a spruce tree at Oakmont's 17th hole, used up three strokes trying unsuccessfully to get out, and took a horrendous quadruple-bogey 8. Warned Rodgers grimly: "Don't forget me. I'll be back."
> GARY PLAYER, 26, is possibly the best foreign player ever to invade the U.S. A powerful driver despite his size (5 ft. 7 in., 150 Ibs.), the swarthy South African sometimes swings so hard that he falls over backward on the tee. Player had never won an amateur tournament when he abruptly turned pro at 17, but he practiced eight hours a day, trimmed off excess weight, built up muscle by lifting weights. In 1956 he borrowed money to finance his first trip abroad. Since then he has won the Masters, the British, Australian and South African Opens, was runner-up to Tommy Bolt in the 1958 U.S. Open, to Palmer in the 1962 Masters, and was leading last week's Open by two strokes on the final day when his putting touch deserted him.